Parasitological profile of Oreochromis niloticus and its relationship with water quality in Tierra Caliente de Guerrero aquaculture farms

Abstract

The investigation was carried out in the Tierra Caliente region of the State of Guerrero between the months of January to October of the year 2018. The objective was to determine the parasitological profile of Oreochromis niloticus and its relation with the water quality in aquaculture farms of said Calentana Region ( represented by nine municipalities), since it represents the largest aquaculture production area and its main source of water supply is the Balsas River and Cutzamala River being one of the most polluted rivers in the state and country; therefore, using its waters without decontamination treatments for the production of food represents a huge risk to human health. For the study an average of seven farms found in the localities of each municipality of the region were sampled and a total of 70 tilapia were analyzed by municipality, with a total of 630 organisms, using the Dissection, Skin Scraping and Coproparasitological techniques, to the detection of adult parasites and eggs. We found 14 genera of parasites of which four are fish specific and ten from other vertebrates, the genera Phagobranchium sp and Trichodina sp had a higher prevalence with 34.44% and 32.22% respectively, being the least prevalent Ascaris sp, Enterobious sp, Heterakis sp and Paragonimus sp with 14.11% each gender. It was determined that the water quality indicator parameters in the tilapia cultures in the Calentana region do not influence the presence of parasites since no significant relationship was found between these variables according to the Pearson Correlation Coefficient, since the p-value is greater than 0.05, therefore the presence of parasites in tilapia crops in the region is attributed to the microbiological contamination of the water supply source.